Carbon Dioxide Ensemble (CO2 Ensemble) is an avant-garde trio from Denver composed of the electronic music composer and the Mile High City’s premier Theremin player Victoria Lundy, her husband and mathematician Thomas Lundy and fellow practitioner of the electronic music arts Mark Mosher whose work in electronic music technology and visual synthesis has been a part of local music and art culture for over a decade. The three met through Mosher’s Rocky Mountain Synth Meet-Up events around 2012 where enthusiasts of that technology and methods for utilizing it in making music would meet up to network and share their passion for synthesizers generally. Shortly into their friendship the Lundys helped to organize an event called Concrete Mixer that has happened a handful of times over the past eight or nine years and a showcase for musique concrète, a type of music composition pioneered by French composer Pierre Schaeffer in the early 1940s with that term coined by Schaeffer in 1948. Those theoretical principles Schaeffer put into practice attracted the interest of composers Pierre Henry, Edgard Varèse, Iannis Xenakis, Karlheinz Stockhausen and others including a popularizer of the art form with one of Schaeffer’s students, Jean-Michel Jarre. The technique of manipulating recorded sound can be heard in looping techniques and the use of samples. CO2 Ensemble hearken back to the earlier method but utilize unconventional sound sources including a large, copper heart that Thomas Lundy rubs with pieces of dry ice to generate frequencies that Mosher processes to enhance and render into different musical forms. Victoria Lundy playing Theremin utilizes one of the oldest electronic music technologies having been patented by Leon Theremin in 1928 with a device that is controlled without physical contact by the performer. Everyone has heard one if they’ve watched any 1950s science fiction film with a spooky soundtrack. Working in tandem the CO2 Ensemble generate highly evocative compositions that suggest textures and primal emotional experiences. Victoria Lundy co-founded what was called the Carbon Dioxide Orchestra in the mid-90s employing similar methods but with less emphasis on the electronic production end and in the 2000s and 2010s she was the Theremin player in experimental pop band The Inactivists who are currently, what else, inactive. The Carbon Dioxide Orchestra concept she revived when Concrete Mixer started up. Mosher was the keyboard player for New Wave cover band Head Full of Zombies based in Colorado Springs from 1989-2003 before branching out into making his own music. The group’s current performance will be the live musical portion of Noche de Terror, a double feature of Rubén Galindo Jr’s Cemetery of Terror (1985) and Don’t Panic (1987) presented by Scream Screen creator and host Theresa Mercado. The trio has a shared affection for B science fiction and horror and cult movies as well as the musical avant-garde and their piece prior to the film screening suits well the Halloween season and the films at hand.
Listen to our interview with Carbon Dioxide Ensemble on Bandcamp and for more information follow the group through its LinkTree. For details on Noche de Terror on October 29, 2022 (the event begins with a costume contest and more at 5:30 with the musical performance at 7) please visit the event link here.
What:Derelicts w/Cyclo-Sonic, Clusterfux and The Lurchers When: Friday, 08.16, 8 p.m. Where: Streets Denver Why: The Derelicts are a bratty punk band from Seattle legendary for its unhinged stage shows in a scene know for them. Lead singer Duane Bodenheimer grew up in Denver and was part of the punk world here before moving to Seattle to join this infamous outfit. Clusterfux are the legendary Denver street punk band that has been going since the early 90s.
What:Flying Lotus in 3D w/Brandon Coleman Spacetalker, Salami Rose Joe Louis, PBDY When: Friday, 08.16, 8 p.m. Where: The Mission Ballroom Why: Flying Lotus returns with his visually stunning “in 3D” performance in support of his new album Flamagra. The sets often involve a bit of a stage set where Steven Ellison aka Flying Lotus controls the sound and perhaps aspects of the visuals for an engulfing audio-visual experience. See below for a taste from 2017. Though Flying Lotus has crossed over between experimental electronic and EDM and funk and hip-hop his imaginative soundscaping continues to evolve in ever more colorful directions with an ear and eye for the presentation of that music for people who show up to craft a mutually inspiring performance.
Saturday | August 17
Little Fyodor and Babushka Band circa 2016, photo by Tom Murphy
What:Sigilcraft with Tom Banger The Art of Making Things Happen: Using Art, Sound and Video to Create Change When: Saturday, 08.17, 2-4 p.m. Where: Mercury Café Why: Tom Banger, former punk/experimental/underground music promoter in Denver through the 80s and into the 90s will demonstrate the use of creative endeavor to enact change in one’s life and beyond. See event page for details including suggestions for bringing imagery from magazines or books in the crafting of the aforementioned sigil. Banger will also present artifacts of his music promotion past at the Central Library on Monday 8/19.
What:Physical Wash, Voight, Entrancer and Staggered Hooks When: Saturday, 08.17, 9 p.m. Where: Rhinoceropolis Why: Physical Wash is the solo project of High Functioning Flesh’s Susan Abstract. Both are melodic and in the classic industrial/EBM mold but whereas HFF is more akin to the likes of Nitzer Ebb and Front 242, Physical Wash is a little weirder and more in the vein of late 80s Skinny Puppy.
What:The Rotten Blue Menace w/The Repercussions, Noogy, Tuck Knee When: Saturday, 08.17, 7 p.m. Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective Why: The Rotten Blue Menace was one of Denver’s greatest ska punk bands in the vein of Choking Victim and Against All Authority before going more or less inactive a few years back. Here’s a chance to see the band at the venue you could most often catch its spirited performances.
What:Denver Art Rock Collective All Stars: Inactivists, Little Fyodor, Gort Vs. Goom, Cattle Axe and The Plastic Rakes When: Saturday, 08.17, 8 p.m. Where: Streets Denver Why: Denver Art Rock Collective is a loose affiliation of bands that don’t really fit into any distinct musical categories but are united by having an eccentric artistic vision behind the music and this event features some of the group’s greatest bands. Naturally punk/noise pioneer Little Fyodor will bring the weirdness as well as great songcraft, Gort Vs. Goom is the Blue Oyster Cult, Melvins and Devo hybrid no one was expecting or asking for but which we need in this bland era and The Inactivists return after who knows how long a hiatus to lay out twisted pop songs too clever for their own good but also catchy enough that in a parallel universe the band would have had a string of hit records. The Plastic Rakes includes former Mourning Sickness guitarist Matt Maher and Cattle Axe includes former New Ancient Astronauts and Superbuick guitarist/vocalist Kasey Elkington.
What:The Claypool Lennon Delirium w/Uni When: Saturday, 08.17, 8 p.m. Where: Ogden Theatre Why: Les Claypool and Sean Lennon’s band together, The Claypool Lennon Delirium, is making some of the most transporting, conceptual psychedelia being made by anyone right now and at the live show you’ll also probably get treated to some inspired reworkings of their respective individual catalog but also some Beatles material as they did “Tomorrow Never Knows” in their current style when the band stopped through to play The Fox Theatre in 2017.
What:Snail Mail w/Choir Boy When: Saturday, 08.17, 8 p.m. Where: Bluebird Theater Why: Lindsey Jordan will eventually outgrow her current phase of songwriting with the gentle guitar work, albeit highly refined and sophisticated, that’s a little too much like that of many of her indie rock peers. But her lyrics reveal someone who is capable of articulating great, vivid nuances of feeling and unconventional thinking.
Sunday | August 18
Phantogram, photo by Reagan Hackleman
What:Old Man Gloom w/Oryx and Echo Beds When: Sunday, 08.18, 8 p.m. Where: Marquis Theater Why: Old Man Gloom is sort of an extreme/atmospheric metal/post-hardcore super group comprised of members of Isis, Converge, Sumac and Cave-In. Its music is haunting, psychedelic and unrelenting. Oryx is an extreme metal band from Denver that is sometimes lumped in with doom and if you’re into doom you won’t be disappointed but Oryx’s presentation and creativity within that realm of music sets it apart from many of its peers. Echo Beds is the organic-industrial post-punk band whose confrontational sound and political lyrics are both harrowing and transcendent.
What:Y La Bamba and Esmé Patterson When: Sunday, 08.18, 6 p.m. Where: Larimer Lounge Why: Y La Bamba is a band from Portland, Oregon that is impossible to pigeonhole as folk or world music or “Latin” or post-punk or experimental pop because it’s all of that to varying degrees. It’s music, though, is a sonically rich and engrossing band whose ability to craft a vivid mood and deeply emotional listening experience that’s transporting and grounding at once is impressive. Esmé Patterson in her now long-standing solo career is an artist whose work is rooted more in feeling and concept than genre. Patterson made her mark in indie folk band Paper Bird but her solo records have all explored the nature of identity and relationships and her live performances seem to experiment with the very format of what a live band can look like and how it can present itself without limiting itself to past expectations.
What:The Claypool Lennon Delirium w/Uni When: Sunday, 08.18, 7:30 p.m. Where: Boulder Theater Why: See above for Claypool Lennon Delirium.
What:Phantogram w/Bob Moses When: Sunday, 08.18, 8 p.m. Where: The Mission Ballroom Why: Phantogram’s synth pop is cinematic and sweeping in scope and presentation even back when the band wasn’t playing rooms as big as The Mission Ballroom. More than some of its early peers, Phantogram created a sound that felt like it was engaging your imagination as much as your emotions and bringing you along for its ride into broad vistas of sound and inspiration while speaking to a broad spectrum of the human experience. Its newer music seems to be expanding into more soulful territory though no album has been forthcoming since 2016’s Three. Its “Into Happiness” single, though, more than hints at its next musical direction.
Monday | August 19
Calexico and Iron & Wine, photo by Piper Ferguson
What:Calexico and Iron & Wine w/Madison Cunningham When: Monday, 08.19, 8 p.m. Where: Denver Botanic Gardens Why: Calexico and Iron & Wine last collaborated on a recording with 2005’s In the Reigns EP. But in 2018 Sam Beam, Joey Burns and John Convertino were able to get together to write and record the eight songs that make up their new record together, 2019’s Years to Burn. It’s the kind of album that sounds like its intricate details were somehow well mapped out and intuitive. Like friends who get each others instincts and share sensibilities and aesthetics. Which given these artists seems obvious. And it’s an album on which thoughts and observations are explored with a sense of life’s complexities and ambiguities and the comfort that can come with being able to navigate through tentative times in your life and in the world if you’re not too set in your ways and hardened to your own heart and the world around you.
What:Punk Show and Tell with Tom Banger When: Monday, 08.19, 6 p.m. Where: Central Library Floor 7 Training Room Why: Denver punk promoter/musician/underground culture legend Tom Banger will present artifacts from his life and times in that world with actual items from his library donated to the Denver Public Library as part of its history collection. It’s a rare and curated glimpse into Denver’s cultural heritage and its connection with underground music and culture around the world.
Tuesday | August 20
BIG|BRAVE, photo by Rachel Cheng
What:Big|Brave w/Deaf Kids, Yakuza, Human Tide, Gruesome Relics and Volunteer Coroner When: Tuesday, 08.20, 8 p.m. Where: Rhinoceropolis Why: It might be an exaggeration to call this the extreme metal show of the month much less the year. But it does include experimental drone metal trio Big|Brave and its contorted atmospherics and emotionally charged vocals, Deaf Kids’ polyrhythmic, psychedelic industrial punk and Yakuza’s menacing, sludgy, dark and heavy yet ethereal drones. And that’s only half the bill.
What:Deathwish w/Cadaverine, Zygrot and Victim of Fire When: Tuesday, 08.20, 7 p.m. Where: Seventh Circle Music Collective Why: Deathwish is the thrash punk band from Madison, Wisconsin, not the UK thrash band from the 80s. But if you’re a fan of the latter it seems like you’d be into the Wisconsin band as both have a similar proclivity for confrontational vocals, burning guitar riffs and a disdain for mainstream normalcy.
Wednesday | August 21
David Dondero circa 2009, photo by Tom Murphy
What:David Dondero and Patrick Dethlefs When: Wednesday, 08.21, 8 p.m. Where: Hi-Dive Why: David Dondero is a lifer whose music reflects a dedication to telling the truth about various corners of human existence and experience through poignant stories delivered with his signature voice warm and sensitive and on the verge of quavering, accompanied by intricate guitar work played with a dynamic urgency. Patrick Dethlefs is a Denver-based singer songwriter whose highly emotive songwriting is thought-provoking and inspires a compassionate examination of your own feelings and reactions to the events in your life through his own openness in singing about his own travails and reflections.
Queen City Sounds and Art 
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